Bruce,
A few years ago, after XJ-S H.E.'s came out, the shop I worked at decided
to do just such a conversion. The car was to be a stock XJ-S supercar.
We used a '76 body, H.E. bumpers, Lister Aero Kit (less cheezy rear pseudo
spoiler), 4-speed. The motor was a Jaguar development test H.E. with 12-1
compression. 3.31:1 rear end. The black leather interior came out of an
'88 (last year for black) which was from a trainload of 35 XJ-S's that derailed
on way to Hess and Eisenhart to be made into convertibles.
Anyway enough about that. The conversion was straightforward I believe, I
didn't work on the car at that stage. The pedal box came from a Boneyard in
England. The Brake pedal had to be fabricated, if I remember correctly.
The gears in the tranny were from a V-12 E. Clutch and flywheel from a V-12 E.
Since only 600 (so I've heard) XJ-S 4-speed cars were produced, you may
have quite a time finding a pedal box that would work. Maybe Lister or your
local Jag dealer can provide one from a newer Getrag equipped XJ-S with the
AJ-6 engine. These were fairly common in England I've heard, due to insurance
classification of the V-12.
Enough tech. The manual transmission conversion in an XJ-S (especially
an H.E.) literally TRANSFORMS the car. IMO, this is how it was meant to be.
The car that I referred to above is quite amazing, especially considering
it was built from Off the shelf Jaguar factory components. The only things
not stock Jag are the 16" 50 series Goodyears and the Lister kit. By the
way, I do recommend the Lister kit, but I don't like the fakey look of the
rear spoiler. Without that, the kit is appealing while not being overstated.
The manual trans XJ-S V-12 is a completely different car. That GM400
slushbox is a joke, and once it's out of the car, you'll wonder why the
engineers at Jag ever put it in. 4-speeds is enough for the H.E. engine,
the car above does 92 MPH at 7000 rpm in SECOND GEAR. Amazing.
Good luck.
PS. I'm on another automotive list, and there has been discussion about
the Tremec 5-speed. It's going to be much smoother than the Jag 4-Speed,
and I've heard many good things about it. I can give you more info.
Greg Meboe MEBOE@wsuvm1.csc.wsu.edu
Dept of Mechanical and Materials Engineering
Washington State University Pullman, Wash.
'67 Spit-6 (Daily) '74 TR-6 (In Progress)
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